Specific growth conditions could be key to treatment of receding hairlines

By Ashley Yeager, 12:11 PM October 21, 2013

Scientists have successfully grown new human hairs on the backs of mice.

Previously, researchers had cultivated adult rodent hair cells in the lab and transplanted them into skin cells to generate new rodent hairs. But doing the same with human hair cells has been difficult.

Now, a team led by Angela Christiano of Columbia University Medical Center in New York has found the right set of conditions to cultivate human hair cells that, when transplanted into mice, grow new human hairs.